Finding Home

There's a chance that moving to a new city doesn't have to be the protracted mess I've managed to turn it into, but why do things the easy way?

I don't really know how to find a new church. I've done it twice in my life, both times with another person to also consider, so picking a place that's right for just me is very much uncharted territory. Obviously, what I want is to arrive somewhere one Sunday morning and think, "This is it. I'm home." Even more obviously: that's not how life works.

The right church doesn't have to be as
pretty as this, but it wouldn't hurt.
Source: Júlia Tan on freeimages.com.

It doesn't help that my church home in Austin, Red River Church, set the bar so high. Trying to find Red River Junior is terribly unfair to the many (presumably) lovely and wonderful churches in Cincinnati that are (one hopes) doing good in the world in the way that best suits their surroundings. Chadwick and I did have a "This is it!" moment our first Sunday at Red River, but that was after about two months of visiting many churches within reasonable bus distance of our home and not finding our people, and after spending six months with a church we had hoped would be right for us but turned out to not quite be the one. That we found our people at Red River one June Sunday was a bit of divine intervention.*

So I've fallen into a cycle of getting up on Sunday morning, full of determination to get at least a step closer to finding the right place for me, only to be discouraged by the time I need to head out because I don't know what set of doors my people are hiding behind. And so I think, "Maybe next week," and kick the discomfort forward to Future Su. Which solves nothing.

By the time this post goes live Sunday morning, I should be somewhere looking for my people. I don't know if I'll find them today, or next week, or next month, and that uncertainty has me in a vortex of displacement.

I wonder if there's a bike church around here?

*So, funny story about our first Sunday in Red River: someone who ended up being a very good friend later on shook my hand with such force that the bones in my hand popped, which happens a lot, but they popped with enough enthusiasm that he felt it, too, and he thought he'd broken something. It was totally worth it just for the look of horror that crossed his face.